Configure Winter Weather Operations

Winter Weather Operations can be used to develop winter weather response plans, monitor winter weather operations in real-time, share near real-time road status updates, and track vehicle locations and materials used during winter weather events.

In this topic, you'll learn how to configure the Winter Weather Operations solution to meet specific needs in your organization.

Manage snow routes and service areas data

Before using the solution, you must create and load your organization's snow routes, service districts, and parking restrictions (if applicable) into the feature layers deployed with the solution. The Winter Weather Data Management ArcGIS Pro project includes a series of tasks to help you prepare, create, and load these foundational layers in the solution.

  1. Sign in to your ArcGIS organization and browse to the Winter Weather Data Management desktop application template.
  2. Open the item page and click Download.
  3. Unzip and open the Winter Weather Data Management project.
  4. On the View tab, in the Window group, click Catalog Pane.
  5. In the Catalog pane, expand the Tasks folder, and double-click the Winter Weather Data Management task.
  6. In the Tasks pane, click the Prepare existing data, Process snow routes, and Append to feature layers task groups to expand the collection of tasks.

Prepare existing data

Your organization may have existing snow routes or street centerline data, features depicting parking restrictions, and service district boundaries. This data can be loaded into the target feature classes in the file geodatabase provided in the Winter Weather Data Management project.

Service districts may represent boundaries within your jurisdiction that your agency uses for driver assignments or other boundaries such as neighborhoods that directors and operations management want to use to compare progress. The service district IDs will later be associated with snow routes, enabling the Winter Weather solutions to measure operations progress and last serviced information based on service districts. Follow the instructions in the Service Districts task to load existing data, add new features if necessary, and define service district IDs.

Snow routes are used to represent street segments your agency is responsible for servicing during winter weather events. Follow the instructions in the Snow Routes task to load existing snow route features and attributes such as road name, route priority, snow route ID, and road class. Additional steps are provided to guide you through populating required fields used by the solution apps and ArcGIS Velocity analytics.

Note:

Valid values are required in the T_AUTOMOBILES and F_AUTOMOBILES fields. These fields are used by the ArcGIS Velocity Snap to Network tool as part of an analytic model delivered with the Winter Weather Operations solution. If you are only using the Winter Weather Outreach solution, or do not have these attributes for your snow routes, these values will be populated for you to indicate that all snow route features represent two-way travel.

Parking restrictions data can be loaded from an existing data source or created from the snow route features uploaded in the Snow Routes task. Follow the instructions in the Parking Restrictions task to load existing data, create features if necessary, and define parking restriction attributes.

Process snow routes

Once snow routes, parking restrictions, and service district information is prepared and loaded into the solution schema, additional refinement is required to process new snow route attributes and features used by solution applications and ArcGIS Velocity analytics. Follow the steps in the Process snow routes task to intersect snow routes with service district information, edit snow route features, create unique snow route identifiers, and calculate snow route segment length.

Note:

Not all steps in the Process snow routes task need to be completed if you are only using the Winter Weather Outreach solution. When applicable, these steps will indicate if it is an optional step when using only the Winter Weather Outreach solution.

Append to feature layers

After preparing and processing existing data into the solutions schema using the Winter Weather Data Management geodatabase, snow routes, parking restrictions, and service district data is now ready to be loaded into feature layers deployed with the solution. Follow the steps in the Append to feature layers task to complete the data management workflows required by the solution.

Inventory vehicles

Create and manage an authoritative inventory of winter fleet vehicle information so you can bring together disparate sources of information and create a common operating picture of vehicles supporting your winter weather operations. Completing the vehicle inventory helps you understand the current state of automated vehicle location (AVL) technology used by your fleet, identify the needs of vehicles without AVL, and document important information for each vehicle required by the solution.

For each vehicle in your fleet, including those you contract with, you will document required vehicle information such as a unique vehicle or asset ID, whether the vehicle is a part of your dedicated fleet or a contracted vehicle, solid material capacity, and what technology will be used to report vehicle location as well as winter-related telemetry for plow up/down status and solid material spreading sensors.

There are two options for completing the vehicle inventory: using the Vehicle Manager in Winter Operations Center, or using the Vehicles Excel spreadsheet. Inventorying vehicle information using the Vehicles Excel spreadsheet enables you to batch upload vehicle information, while the Vehicle Manager form enables you to add one vehicle at a time and modify existing vehicle information once added to the solution's Vehicles table.

Add a vehicle using the Vehicle Manager

Complete the following steps to inventory vehicles one at a time using the Vehicle Manager in the Winter Operations Center app.

  1. Sign in to your ArcGIS organization and browse to the Winter Operations Center app.
  2. Open the item page and click View.

    The Winter Operations Center home page is opened by default.

  3. Click Vehicles on the navigation menu.
  4. Click Add New Vehicle.

    The Add New Vehicle window appears.

  5. Type a value for Vehicle ID. This question is required.

    Note:

    This form prevents you from entering a vehicle ID already entered into the system. Ensure vehicle IDs entered here are unique and that they match the same unique asset ID or vehicle ID used by your vendor AVL system. If the vehicle you are adding will require drivers to use location sharing in the Status Reporter QuickCapture project, use a unique ID to identify this vehicle, such as an equipment asset number, VIN, or license plate number.

  6. Optionally, the Vehicle Name question is used to provide an alternate name for the vehicle.
  7. The Fleet or Contractor question is required and is used to indicate if this vehicle is part of a dedicated fleet or a contracted resource.
  8. The Automated Vehicle Location Reporting question is required is used to document the existing technology, or technology needed on this vehicle, that will report vehicle location and service status during winter weather operations.

    Vendor AVL Only

    Select this option to indicate the vehicle is supported by an AVL system or device where both location and sensors for plow up/down and spreaders are present. This option should also be selected if an AVL system or device reports location but has limited or no sensors for the plow or spreaders, but you chose to always indicate an in-service status when the vehicle is in operations.

    ArcGIS Only

    Select this option to indicate drivers of this vehicle will use the Status Reporter QuickCapture project to report vehicle location and service status during operations. This vehicle has no AVL system or device on board.

    Vendor AVL Location with ArcGIS Field Operations

    Select this option to indicate drivers of this vehicle will use the Status Reporter QuickCapture project to augment sensor information to indicate their service status during operations. This vehicle has an AVL system or device that only reports vehicle location, but has limited or no sensor information for the plow or spreaders that would otherwise indicate service status.

  9. Optionally, the Plow Function question is used to document the primary role, assignment, route, or road class this plow will be used on.
  10. The Salt / Solid Material Capacity question is required and is used to document, in U.S. tons, the solid material capacity of the vehicle.
  11. Optionally, the Brine Capacity question is used to document, in gallons, the brine or wet mix capacity of the vehicle.
  12. Optionally, the Make and Model question is used to document the make and model of the vehicle.
  13. Optionally, the Plow Type question is used to document the type of snowplow blade attached to the vehicle.
  14. Optionally, the Vehicle Status question is used to document whether the vehicle is available for operations.
  15. Click Submit.

Upload vehicle information in bulk

Follow the steps below to complete the vehicle inventory by uploading information for your entire fleet at once using the Vehicles Microsoft Excel document.

  1. Confirm that you are signed in to your ArcGIS organization and browse to the Vehicles Microsoft Excel item.
  2. From the item page, click Download.
  3. Open and edit the Vehicles.xlsx file and provide the vehicle information. Required vehicle fields are noted in the spreadsheet, and valid values, where applicable, are provided in column drop-down menus.

    Once complete, save and close the file.

  4. In your ArcGIS organization, browse to the OperationsManagement feature layer.
  5. From the item page, click Update Data > Append Data to Layer.
  6. Click Choose File, browse to the spreadsheet, and click OK.
  7. Click Upload and Continue.
  8. Ensure the Choose the layer to update is set to Vehicles.

    Uncheck Update existing features.

  9. Click Apply Updates.

Provision users

After completing the vehicle inventory, reference the Location Source field in the Vehicles table. If all vehicles are identified as Vendor AVL Only, you can proceed to the next topic, Configure feeds.

If you have identified any vehicle's Location Source field as ArcGIS Only or Vendor AVL Locations with ArcGIS Field Operations, complete the next three sections starting with this section, Provision Users, to support drivers of these vehicles with ArcGIS location sharing and field operations capabilities.

Included with the Winter Weather Operations solution is a group designed to help organize drivers, provide access to the Status Reporter QuickCapture project, and add drivers to an ArcGIS Tracker view.

Note:

User accounts must already be created for drivers before you can perform this workflow. Drivers user accounts must have a minimum user type of Mobile Worker in order to use the Status Reporter QuickCapture project.

To add drivers to the Winter Operations Drivers group, complete the following steps:

  1. In a browser, sign in to your ArcGIS organization.
    Verify that you have privileges to manage member groups before continuing.
  2. At the top of the site, click Groups.
  3. Click the Winter Operations Drivers group to open the group details page.
  4. Click the Overview tab and click Invite members.
  5. Select the members you want to add and click Add to group.
  6. Repeat these steps for each group that you need to add members to.

Update the Status Reporter project

When completing the vehicle inventory, you may have identified vehicles that either did not have an existing AVL technology on board or had limited AVL technology (no telemetry or sensor information for plow up/down and solid material spreader information). In the inventory, you identified these vehicles as either ArcGIS Only (no existing AVL technology) or Vendor AVL Locations with ArcGIS Field Operations.

Referencing the vehicle information created in the previous steps, you will add the vehicle IDs to the Status Reporter QuickCapture project and share the project with drivers.

  1. Confirm that you are signed in to your ArcGIS organization and browse to the ArcGIS QuickCapture application.
  2. Click the Status Reporter project to open it.
  3. Click the Vehicle ID button to manage project user input.
  4. Click the Edit button Edit for Vehicle ID under Project User Input.

    The Edit user input window appears.

  5. Click Batch edit.
  6. Delete the example entries, and provide the Vehicle ID value for any vehicle in your inventory where Location Source is ArcGIS Only or Vendor AVL Locations with ArcGIS Field Operations.

    Click Save.

  7. Click Done.
  8. Click Save.

Create a track view

When completing the vehicle inventory, you may have identified vehicles in your fleet with no AVL technology on board. The drivers of these vehicles will use devices in the vehicle to report vehicle location using ArcGIS location sharing technology.

Referencing the vehicle information created in the previous steps, you will use Track Viewer to create a track view of drivers supporting your operations.

  1. In a browser, sign in to your organization and open Track Viewer.

    By default, Track Viewer is in the app launcher you Enable location sharing and you have the view location tracks privilege.

  2. Click Create View.
  3. Type the name ArcGIS Snowplow Drivers, or provide a different name and click Create View.
    Tip:

    Make a note of the name used for the view. You will reference the name of this view in later steps when creating vehicle feeds in ArcGIS Velocity.

    When you create the view, a group in ArcGIS Online that controls access to the view is also created.

  4. On the Mobile Users tab, add drivers whose last known locations and tracks should be seen in the track view.
    1. Click the drop-down menu for Select to add mobile users.
    2. Scroll the list to the Groups (import members) section and select the Winter Operations Drivers group.
    3. Click Add.
Note:

While you can add any user as a mobile user, that user won't have a last known location or track until they are tracked with the ArcGIS Tracker mobile app or tracked with the Field Maps mobile app.

You have created a track view of drivers supporting your winter weather operations using Track Viewer and location sharing within the Status Reporter QuickCapture project to report their vehicle location. You are now ready to configure a feed in ArcGIS Velocity to connect to this track view.

Configure feeds

A feed is a real-time stream of data coming into ArcGIS Velocity. Feeds typically connect to external sources of observational data such as Internet of Things (IoT) platforms, message brokers, or third-party APIs. Feeds parse incoming tabular, point, polyline, or polygon data and expose it for analysis and visualization.

The feed deployed with the solution, Vehicles_servicestatus Feed, is already configured for you and only requires that you start the feed. You will also use feeds to connect to and ingest location data generated by your vehicles, whether from a vendor AVL system, drivers using ArcGIS location sharing on their devices, or a mix of both, depending on the needs identified during the vehicle inventory. The steps to configure vehicle feeds will vary depending on the needs of your organization.

Note:

Follow the steps in the order they are presented below when configuring feeds and analytics.

Start the Vehicles_servicestatus Feed

The Vehicles_servicestatus Feed ingests records from the Vehicles_servicestatus feature layer view. This join view contains all vehicle records stored in the Vehicles table (OperationsManagement feature layer), and if present, is joined with the latest records created in the Service Status layer (WinterFieldOperations feature layer). Creating a feed from this join view enables the Winter Weather Operations solution to create a common operating picture from multiple vehicle feed sources.

This feed is already configured and executable. Complete the following steps to start the feed:

  1. Confirm that you are signed in to your ArcGIS organization and browse to the ArcGIS Velocity application.
  2. Using the site menu, click Feeds.
  3. Click Vehicle_servicestatus Feed to launch the feed Details page.
  4. Click Start to start the feed.

Configure vehicle feeds

Configure vehicle feeds to connect to an automated vehicle location system through a supported third-party API or message broker using supported feed types in ArcGIS Velocity. If drivers are using ArcGIS location sharing on devices in their vehicles, you can also configure vehicle feeds to consume the track view of drivers supporting winter operations created in previous steps.

Complete the following steps to configure a vehicle feed from a track view created in Track Viewer:

  1. Open the ArcGIS Velocity application.
  2. Click Create feed.
  3. Click See all in the ArcGIS feed type.
  4. Click Feature Layer.
  5. From the Configure Feature Layer page, if not already set, change the search context to My Content, and then search for and select the ArcGIS Snowplow Drivers feature service.

    Under Select a sublayer, click to select Last Known Locations (1).

  6. Leave the default parameters for the Filter Data step and select Next.
  7. Leave the default parameters for the Confirm Schema step and select Next.
  8. Change the Date field for latest features to location_timestamp and select Next.
  9. Leave the default parameters for the Identify Key Fields step and select Next.
  10. Change the Feed Polling Interval value to Runs periodically every 10 seconds Every day and click Next.
  11. Name the feed ArcGIS Snowplow Drivers Feed and optionally provide a summary.

    An alternate name can be used for your vehicle feed, but the vehicle feed name above will be referenced in subsequent steps.

  12. Click Complete to finish configuring the feed.

You have just configured a feed to ingest vehicle locations reported by drivers with ArcGIS location sharing technology on their devices. Follow the steps below to configure a vehicle feed to connect to a third-party API, data provider, cloud, or message broker, or proceed to Update analytics.

When configuring feeds to connect to a third-party API, data provider, cloud, or message broker, consider the information gathered during the vehicle inventory. If the vehicle inventory indicates all vehicles are supported by your vendor AVL (Location Source is Vendor AVL Only for all vehicles), you only need to create a single vehicle feed. If you identified any vehicles with AVL that do not have additional telemetry to indicate an in-service status during operations such as plow up/down and active material spreading (Location Source is Vendor AVL Location with ArcGIS Field Operations), you need to create a feed for these vehicles as well so drivers can report their service status using the Status Reporter QuickCapture project.

Complete the following steps to configure a vehicle to connect to your vendor AVL provider:

  1. Open the ArcGIS Velocity application.
  2. Click Create feed.
  3. Choose the feed type you want to create by browsing the groups of feeds or by searching using a keyword. The feed types needed to connect to your vendor AVL are grouped into three categories:
    • Cloud
    • Web and Messaging
    • Data Providers
  4. Select the feed type you want to create.
  5. Enter the feed configuration details. Note that the configuration parameters vary depending on the feed type selected.
  6. Click Next to continue with the remaining steps, including confirming the schema, identifying the key fields, and defining the polling interval (if applicable). Pause on the last step, Save, to name your feed according to the following choices:
    • Name your vehicle feed AVL Snowplows Feed for a feed supporting vehicles whose Location Source field is set to Vendor AVL Only.
    • Name your vehicle feed AVL Location Only Snowplows Feed for a feed supporting vehicles whose Location Source field is set to Vendor AVL Location and ArcGIS Field Operations.
      Note:

      Alternate names can be used for your vehicle feeds, but the above vehicle feed names will be referenced in subsequent steps.

  7. Click Complete to finish configuring the feed.
    Note:

    For more information, see Configure input data and the Create a feed quick lesson.

Update analytics

Two ArcGIS Velocity analytics, one real-time analytic and one big data analytic, are deployed with the solution and must be updated once all feeds have been configured and are successfully running.

Real-time analytics perform processing on data ingested from feeds, analyzing each individual message as it is received. Real-time analytics are used especially for transforming data, geofencing, and incident detection. The real-time analytics delivered with this solution are configured to transform one or more vehicle feeds into a common operating picture.

Big data analytics perform batch analysis and processing on stored data such as data in a feature layer or cloud big data stores such as Amazon S3 and Azure Blob Storage. Big data analytics are typically used for summarizing observations, performing pattern analysis, and incident detection. The big data analytics delivered with this solution are configured to provide near real-time route status updates, store vehicle location history, and summarize material usage and distance traveled.

Note:

All feature layer outputs generated by the analytics have specific data retention settings—and where applicable, archiving settings—already configured. Any modifications to data retention and archiving settings should be made before the analytics run for the first time, and after reading guidance in the Modify the Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic and Update the Snow Route Status big data analytic workflows below. Read more about data retention in ArcGIS Velocity.

Modify the Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic

The Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic connects to and merges vehicle and service status information with one or more vehicle feeds, and generates two outputs, VehicleStream and VehicleTracks.

  • VehicleStream is used to visualize last known vehicle locations for the entire fleet. VehicleStream consists of a stream layer and a feature layer storing only the latest records for each vehicle.
  • The VehicleTracks feature layer is used as an input for multiple tools in the Snow Route Status big data analytic. A short data retention window and no archiving is configured for this output, as vehicle location history with archiving is already configured for this data on a different output generated by the Snow Route Status big data analytic.

The Winter Fleet Tracking analytic has been designed to support three different configurations of vehicle feeds consistent with the needs identified in the vehicle inventory and the vehicle feed or feeds you configured in the previous step. The Winter Fleet Tracking analytic will need to be modified to fit the needs of your organization by locating the correct vehicle feed pipeline in the analytic and replacing the broken placeholder feeds with your vehicle feeds. The steps below outline various tasks for updating the Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic to fit the needs of your organization.

Complete the following steps to update the analytic with your vehicle feed and delete unused vehicle feed pipelines:

  1. In the ArcGIS Velocity app, use the site menu and click Real-Time.
  2. Click the Edit button Edit for the Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic.
  3. Add your vehicle feed or feeds to the analytic by clicking Feeds from the tools menu, and click Select existing feed.
  4. Click your vehicle feed in the list and click Confirm.
  5. If you configured more than one vehicle feed, repeat the steps above for each vehicle feed.
  6. Review the broken placeholder feeds list below and their pipelines in the model. You will replace your vehicle feed with the corresponding pipeline.
    • If you configured an ArcGIS Snowplow Drivers Feed, delete the placeholder ArcGIS Location Tracking Feed and connect your feed as the Target in the Dynamic Attribute Join on Username tool.
    • If you configured an AVL Location Only Snowplow Feed, delete the placeholder AVL Location Only Feed and connect your feed as the Target in the Dynamic Attribute Join on VehicleID tool.
    • If you configured an AVL Snowplow Feed, delete the placeholder AVL Feed and connect your feed as the Target in the Dynamic Attribute Join on VehicleID-1 tool.
      Note:

      Do not delete the Vehicles_servicestatus Feed, regardless of which vehicle feed pipeline is used.

  7. Click Save to commit your changes and validate the analytic.
  8. Once vehicle feeds are connected to the correct pipeline, unused vehicle feed pipelines must be deleted from the model. See the image in step 9 below for the Winter Fleet Tracking analytic configured to support the ArcGIS Snowplow Drivers Feed and the AVL Snowplow Feed.
    • If only one vehicle feed is used, delete all other vehicle feed pipelines from the placeholder vehicle feed to the Merge tool. Reconnect your vehicle feed's pipeline from the Map Fields tool to the Calculate Processed Datetime tool.

      Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic
      The configuration of the Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic is shown when only one vehicle feed pipeline is used. Unused analytic pipelines have been removed from the model.

      Click to view a larger version
    • If two of the three vehicle feeds are used, ensure that the pipelines merge after the Map Fields tool and connect directly from the Merge tool to the Calculate Processed Datetime tool.
      Note:

      You can select multiple nodes in the model by pressing the Ctrl key while selecting each node. Click Delete to remove the selected nodes from the model. If you make a mistake when deleting nodes, use keyboard shortcuts Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Y to undo and redo edits, respectively.

  9. Click Save to commit your changes and validate the analytic.
    • If ArcGIS Snowplow Drivers is the only vehicle feed pipeline in your analytic, click Start to turn on the Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic. No additional configuration is needed, since the schema was already known by the pipeline tools connecting to the feed.

    • If you have additional vehicle feeds in your model, continue configuring your vehicle feed pipelines following the steps below.

No additional configuration is needed if you are only using the ArcGIS Snowplow Drivers Feed pipeline, since the schema was already known by the tools connecting to the feed. Additional configuration is required if you are using a vendor AVL for your vehicle feeds (AVL Snowplow Feed or AVL Location Only Snowplow Feed), since the schemas for these feeds vary for different AVL vendors.

Complete the following steps to finish configuring the AVL Snowplow Feed in the Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic.

  1. Double-click Dynamic Attribute Join on VehicleID to open the tool properties.
  2. Click the Target field drop-down menu and select the asset or vehicle ID from your feed.

    This is the same vehicle ID value recorded in the vehicle inventory.

  3. Click Apply.
  4. Click Save to commit recent changes and validate the analytic.
  5. Double-click Calculate Field-1 to open the tool properties.
  6. Click the Edit button Edit for servicetype.

    The servicetype field will be used to transform raw values from your vehicle feed that indicate plow up/down and material spreading rates, open gates, or other relevant values from your vehicle feed, to values used by the solution to indicate whether the vehicle is actively servicing a road and what type of service is being performed.

  7. Click the Edit button Edit again and click Configure Arcade expression. Use Arcade to classify raw values from the feed to a valid value below:
    • In-transit
    • Plowing and deicing
    • Plowing
    • Deicing
    • Anti-icing

    
    //Example Arcade expression to classify values from the feed to values used by the solution
    
    var plowstatus = $feature.yourplowfield
    //example values are text, include "up", "down"
    
    var materialstatus = $feature.yourmaterialfield
    // example values are numeric
    
    if (plowstatus == "up" && materialstatus = 0) {
         return 'In-transit'
    }
    if (plowstatus == "down" && materialstatus > 0) {
         return 'Plowing and deicing'
    }
    if (plowstatus == "down" && materialstatus = 0) {
         return 'Plowing'
    }
    if (plowstatus == "up" && materialstatus > 0) {
         return 'Deicing'
    }
    ...

  8. Double-click the Map Fields-2 tool to open the field properties.
  9. Refer to the table below for a list of output fields that must be mapped with your vehicle feed's input.

    <feed field name>

    speedmph

    <feed field name>

    heading

    <feed field name>

    vehicleid

    <feed field name>

    location_timestamp

    Some fields may require you to transform existing values into the data or value type defined by the output field. For example, if your feed contains speed expressed as meters per second, use the following Arcade expression to calculate miles per hour:

    //Example Arcade expression
    
    Floor($feature["yourspeedfield"]*2.237.

  10. Click Apply.
  11. Click Save to commit your changes and validate the analytic.

Complete the following steps to finish configuring the AVL Location Only Snowplow Feed in the Winter Fleet Tracking real-time analytic.

  1. Double-click Dynamic Attribute Join on VehicleID to open the tool properties.
  2. Click the Target field drop-down menu and select the asset or vehicle ID from your feed.

    This is the same vehicle ID value recorded in the vehicle inventory.

  3. Click Apply.
  4. Double-click the Map Fields-1 tool to open the field properties.
  5. Refer to the table below for a list of output fields that must be mapped with your vehicle feed's input.

    <feed field name>

    speedmph

    <feed field name>

    heading

    <feed field name>

    vehicleid

    <feed field name>

    location_timestamp

    Some fields may require you to transform existing values into the data or value type defined by the output field. For example, if your feed contains speed expressed as meters per second, use the following Arcade expression to calculate miles per hour:

    //Example Arcade expression
    
    Floor($feature["yourspeedfield"]*2.237.

    The remaining fields are already configured. Since drivers of these vehicles are using the Status Reporter QuickCapture project, the service status is sourced from the Vehicles_servicestatus feed.

  6. Click Apply.
  7. Click Save to save and validate the analytic.
  8. Click Start to start the real-time analytic.

Update the Snow Route Status big data analytic

Snow Route Status is a scheduled big data analytic and is configured with four different analytic pipelines and feature layer outputs to support near real-time route status updates, summarize material used (U.S. tons) and distance traveled (miles) by each vehicle, and store vehicle location history during active winter events.

  • The first analytic pipeline derives an output feature layer that displays the last time an in-service snowplow visited a given snow route segment. As a referenced feature layer output, data retention and archiving properties are set by the Reset Snow Routes big data analytic that originally created this output feature layer. A shorter retention period without archiving is defined for this output, as route features are designed to be updated regularly during active winter weather operations.
    Note:

    By default, the only records from the VehicleTracks feature layer that will not be processed by the analytic and shown as last serviced is the "In Transit" value in the servicestatus field. All other values in the servicestatus field, including null or empty values, will be processed and treated as an in-service status. This can be modified by updating the Arcade expression in the Join Features tool.

  • The second analytic pipeline summarizes the distance traveled (miles) by each vehicle during an event and associates the event start date with each record generated. This feature layer output is configured to retain data for one year before it is archived, meaning Velocity will maintain up to two years of your data.
  • The third analytic pipeline stores vehicle location history and associates the event start date with each record generated. This feature layer output is configured to retain data for one year before it is archived, meaning Velocity will maintain up to two years of your data.
  • The fourth analytic pipeline summarizes the material used (US tons) by each vehicle during an event and associates the event start date with each record generated. This feature layer output is configured to retain data for one year before it is archived, meaning Velocity will maintain up to two years of your data

Complete the following steps to update and start the Snow Route Status big data analytic:

  1. In the ArcGIS Velocity app, use the site menu and click Big Data Analytic.
  2. On the Big Data Analytics page, click the Edit button Edit for the Snow Route Status big data analytic.
  3. Note the broken nodes in the analytic for Vehicle Tracks. When the solution was initially deployed, this feature service did not yet exist. Double-click the VehicleTracks node to open the source data properties.
  4. Click Edit.
  5. Change the search context from ArcGIS to My Content, and then search for and select the VehicleTracks_UniqueID feature service.

    Ensure that Feature Service is selected, not the map service of the same name.

  6. Click Next.

    The parameter values are preconfigured for all remaining steps and should not be modified.

  7. Select Next for the Filter Data, Confirm Schema, and Timestamp Field steps.
  8. Leave the preconfigured values in the Identify Key Fields step and click Complete.

    The analytic is validated, indicated by a green check mark at the top of the page.

  9. Click Save to commit recent updates to the analytic.
  10. Click Start to run the scheduled big data analytic.
Note:

The Snow Route Status big data analytic is configured to run every three minutes. Change this interval to meet the needs of your organization.

You have completed the steps for updating the ArcGIS Velocity analytics delivered with the solution.

Schedule the Winter Weather Operations Notebook

The Winter Weather Operations Notebook can be used by mapping technicians and operations managers to automate data management and ArcGIS Velocity tasks when scheduled to run as a task in ArcGIS Online.

When a new Winter Event is created in the Winter Operations Center app, at its next scheduled run time, the notebook will start all feeds and analytics associated with the solution.

When operations managers end the Winter Event, at its next scheduled run time, the notebook will stop all feeds and analytics associated with the solution, reset route status information, and truncate records stored in the Service Status layer of the WinterFieldOperations feature layer.

Complete the following steps to schedule the Winter Weather Operations Notebook to run as a scheduled task in ArcGIS Online:

Note:

You must be assigned a role of Administrator or a custom role that includes the privilege to create, edit, and schedule notebooks in order to run and schedule ArcGIS Notebooks and complete the steps below.

  1. Confirm that you are signed in to your ArcGIS organization and browse to the Winter Weather Operations Notebook item.
  2. Open the item page and click Open Notebook.
  3. Click Tasks.
  4. Click Create Task.
  5. For Title, type Winter Event Task and click Next.
  6. Leave the default values to schedule the notebook to run every 15 minutes.

    Click Create Task to finish scheduling the notebook.

Configure the Material Reporter form

The Material Reporter form can be used by operations managers and yard supervisors to record material used for any vehicle during an active operation. Material used can be reported from the Winter Operations Center Vehicles page and with additional configuration can also be used as a stand-alone survey.

Complete the following steps to configure the Material Reporter form to be a used as a stand-alone survey:

  1. Install ArcGIS Survey123 Connect.
  2. Start ArcGIS Survey123 Connect and sign in to your ArcGIS organization.
  3. Click Material Reporter to download the survey.
  4. In the Download window, click Download and click OK.
  5. Click Material Reporter to open the survey.
  6. On the left, from the side toolbar, click the XLSForm button.
  7. In the Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, click the survey tab if it is not already active.
  8. Type or paste the following text into cell F4 of the spreadsheet, replacing the text placeholder with the feature service URL of the Vehicles table in the OperationsManagement table (hosted) deployed with the solution.

    autocomplete search("vehicles?url=placeholder")

  9. Save and close the Microsoft Excel spreadsheet and preview your changes in ArcGIS Survey123 Connect.
  10. Click Publish survey to publish your changes, and then click OK.